International Telecommunication Union (ITU) standard “G.hn” was defined to enable broadband data communication required by in-house broadband applications. In G.hn, different domains are available for in-house network access by different media, like copper twisted-pairs, coaxial cables, and power line cables.
To date, troubleshooting and diagnostics of in-house networks, also known as home networks, from a remote location outside of the network is a challenging task. In particular, the identification of size and structure of a home network is challenging due to a potential large number of branches and terminations within the home network.
To further illustrate the problem, examples of home networks with relatively simple structures and one branch and three branches, respectively, are shown in FIG. 1. Channel gain functions are depicted in FIG. 2 in an upper part for the one-branch network, and in a lower part of FIG. 2 for the three-branch network of FIG. 1.
More complex examples of home networks are described in FIG. 3. In an upper part, FIG. 3 schematically depicts a home network formed by a power line network or a twisted-pair network comprising twelve nodes and five branches. A lower part of FIG. 1 shows another home network built up of coaxial line technology.
When considering more complex home network topologies, such as in particular Power Line Communication (PLC) networks including a large number of nodes and branches, available solutions of home network topology identification methods are not as efficient as is desirable from a service operator perspective, due to a much more complex channel gain function and the huge number of reflections occurring in all branches of the home network.